Heroes & Zeros: Change Org & BillBoard North West

This week in Heroes and Zeros, there is a petition to put the Raven Symoné mess to rest and an attention whoring magazine with inappropriate tweets for North West.

Hero- Change.org Petition to Fire Raven Symoné

There are no words for how happy I was to see this and the reason stems from the fact that Raven Symoné is not a real representation of black people. Period. I can’t really put it in any other terms. Yes, the change.org petition demanding Barbara Walters to fire her from The View has gotten close to 100,000 signatures, and it’s because people are tired of sitting back and watching this woman make a fool of herself and make a fool of the black community.

The woman who started the petition, Che Scott- Heron, lives in the UK and hit the nail on the head as to the reason for the petition- Raven Symoné is a joke. I am more than confident that I will never agree with or support anything she does. I don’t trust the former child star, and I believe she thinks she is better than other people from whom she tries so hard to distance herself.

The petition and Scott-Heron are Heroes because change will never come unless those affected by people and issues stand up and take the first step in making things happen. Now, does the petition automatically mean that The View will get rid of Raven? No. But what it does do is let’s them and others know that black people are tired of the bum ass representations that are on TV. Yes, there are other women on other daily talk shows that conduct themselves with respect concerning their “people” but Raven is young and for the sake of ratings I am sure, allowed to say whatever she wants without censorship and that is bad for black people.

And this is why is say that; black people get so much criticism for being destructive, negative, violent and lazy that when we stand up in the ways available to us to express how we feel about a situation, that needs to be recognized and commended as well.

So yes, the change.org petition to remove Raven Symoné from the view is a great hero and one that I hope continues to win.

This week, Billboard, the music magazine, that tracks the popularity of songs in different genre’s is this week’s zero for two reasons.

First of all, they used a picture of North West to get attention on Twitter. It would not have been so bad if they had done it in an innocent kid-appropriate way, but they didn’t. They used a picture of the two-year-old licking a lollipop while her mother is holding her and captioned it, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” There are no words so communicate how outrageous and disgusting this was of Billboard and of course, Twitter went in on them about it. How dare they try to cause shock and awe by insinuating that this little girl (who is a cutie by the way) knows how to use her tongue in the same manner in which her mother does or did in the sex tape that made her famous? That was a desperate move that I just don’t understand.

The other reason for their zero status is because they tried to explain away their actions and pin it on us for taking it the way in which most people did. They insulted not only a little girl who can’t fend for herself but our intelligence too as people who know a load of crap when we see it. They tweeted,

“We apologize for the tweet involving North West. The caption was about her comments to paparazzi. The suggestion some see was not intended.”

What they are saying with this statement is that our minds are so much in the gutter, we default to automatically thinking the worst. But the truth is, we perceived it exactly the way they wanted us to. Because if it were true that they were trying to draw the comparison between Nori telling paparazzi “I said no pictures” to her father’s hatred for the invasive photographers, then they would have used a picture of him point blank. They are, in essence lying. Which goes to show the lengths that magazines and other brands will go to get publicity. Billboard was an attention whore this week and because of the way they went about it, they are definitely a Zero.

Founder of The CurvyGirl Diva Blog, Rasheda lends her opinions and insights about everything from life, fashion, entertainment and pop culture to various websites and blogs. Her motto “tear shit up” guides her writing and her life.